the luck of rorain

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The Luck of Roaring Camp

by Bret Harte

An illustration for the story The Luck of Roaring Camp by the author Bret Harte

There was commotion in Roaring Camp. It could not have been a fight, for in 1850 that was not

novel enough to have called together the entire settlement. The ditches and claims were not only

deserted, but "Tuttle's grocery" had contributed its gamblers, who, it will be remembered, calmly

continued their game the day that French Pete and Kanaka Joe shot each other to death over the bar

in the front room. The whole camp was collected before a rude cabin on the outer edge of the

clearing. Conversation was carried on in a low tone, but the name of a woman was frequently

repeated. It was a name familiar enough in the camp,--"Cherokee Sal."

Perhaps the less said of her the better. She was a coarse and, it is to be feared, a very sinful woman.

But at that time she was the only woman in Roaring Camp, and was just then lying in sore extremity,

when she most needed the ministration of her own sex. Dissolute, abandoned, and irreclaimable,

she was yet suffering a martyrdom hard enough to bear even when veiled by sympathizing

womanhood, but now terrible in her loneliness. The primal curse had come to her in that original

isolation which must have made the punishment of the first transgression so dreadful. It was,

perhaps, part of the expiation of her sin that, at a moment when she most lacked her sex's intuitivetenderness and care, she met only the half-contemptuous faces of her masculine associates. Yet a

few of the spectators were, I think, touched by her sufferings. Sandy Tipton thought it was "rough on

Sal," and, in the contemplation of her condition, for a moment rose superior to the fact that he had

an ace and two bowers in his sleeve.

It will be seen also that the situation was novel. Deaths were by no means uncommon in Roaring

Camp, but a birth was a new thing. People had been dismissed the camp effectively, finally, and with

no possibility of return; but this was the first time that anybody had been introduced AB INITIO.Hence the excitement.



"You go in there, Stumpy," said a prominent citizen known as "Kentuck," addressing one of the

loungers. "Go in there, and see what you kin do. You've had experience in them things."

Perhaps there was a fitness in the selection. Stumpy, in other climes, had been the putative head of

two families; in fact, it was owing to some legal informality in these proceedings that Roaring Camp--

a city of refuge--was indebted to his company. The crowd approved the choice, and Stumpy was

wise enough to bow to the majority. The door closed on the extempore surgeon and midwife, and

Roaring Camp sat down outside, smoked its pipe, and awaited the issue.

The assemblage numbered about a hundred men. One or two of these were actual fugitives from

justice, some were criminal, and all were reckless. Physically they exhibited no indication of theirpast lives and character. The greatest scamp had a Raphael face, with a profusion of blonde hair;

Oakhurst, a gambler, had the melancholy air and intellectual abstraction of a Hamlet; the coolest

and most courageous man was scarcely over five feet in height, with a soft voice and an

embarrassed, timid manner. The term "roughs" applied to them was a distinction rather than a

definition. Perhaps in the minor details of fingers, toes, ears, etc., the camp may have been deficient,

but these slight omissions did not detract from their aggregate force. The strongest man had but

three fingers on his right hand; the best shot had but one eye.

Such was the physical aspect of the men that were dispersed around the cabin. The camp lay in a

triangular valley between two hills and a river. The only outlet was a steep trail over the summit of a

hill that faced the cabin, now illuminated by the rising moon. The suffering woman might have seen

it from the rude bunk whereon she lay,--seen it winding like a silver thread until it was lost in the

stars above.

A fire of withered pine boughs added sociability to the gathering. By degrees the natural levity of

Roaring Camp returned. Bets were freely offered and taken regarding the result. Three to five that

"Sal would get through with it;" even that the child would survive; side bets as to the sex and

complexion of the coming stranger. In the midst of an excited discussion an exclamation came from

those nearest the door, and the camp stopped to listen. Above the swaying and moaning of the

pines, the swift rush of the river, and the crackling of the fire rose a sharp, querulous cry,--a cry

unlike anything heard before in the camp. The pines stopped moaning, the river ceased to rush, and

the fire to crackle. It seemed as if Nature had stopped to listen too.

The camp rose to its feet as one man! It was proposed to explode a barrel of gunpowder; but in

consideration of the situation of the mother, better counsels prevailed, and only a few revolverswere discharged; for whether owing to the rude surgery of the camp, or some other reason,



Cherokee Sal was sinking fast. Within an hour she had climbed, as it were, that rugged road that led

to the stars, and so passed out of Roaring Camp, its sin and shame, forever. I do not think that the

announcement disturbed them much, except in speculation as to the fate of the child. "Can he live

now?" was asked of Stumpy. The answer was doubtful. The only other being of Cherokee Sal's sex

and maternal condition in the settlement was an ass. There was some conjecture as to fitness, but

the experiment was tried. It was less problematical than the ancient treatment of Romulus and

Remus, and apparently as successful.

When these details were completed, which exhausted another hour, the door was opened, and the

anxious crowd of men, who had already formed themselves into a queue, entered in single file.

Beside the low bunk or shelf, on which the figure of the mother was starkly outlined below the

blankets, stood a pine table. On this a candle- box was placed, and within it, swathed in staring red

flannel, lay the last arrival at Roaring Camp. Beside the candle-box was placed a hat. Its use was soon

indicated. "Gentlemen," said Stumpy, with a singular mixture of authority and EX OFFICIO

complacency,-- "gentlemen will please pass in at the front door, round the table, and out at the back

door. Them as wishes to contribute anything toward the orphan will find a hat handy." The first man

entered with his hat on; he uncovered, however, as he looked about him, and so unconsciously set

an example to the next. In such communities good and bad actions are catching. As the procession

filed in comments were audible,--criticisms addressed perhaps rather to Stumpy in the character of

showman; "Is that him?" "Mighty small specimen;" "Has n't more 'n got the color;" "Ain't bigger nor

a derringer." The contributions were as characteristic: A silver tobacco box; a doubloon; a navy

revolver, silver mounted; a gold specimen; a very beautifully embroidered lady's handkerchief (from

Oakhurst the gambler); a diamond breastpin; a diamond ring (suggested by the pin, with the remark

from the giver that he "saw that pin and went two diamonds better"); a slung-shot; a Bible

(contributor not detected); a golden spur; a silver teaspoon (the initials, I regret to say, were not the

giver's); a pair of surgeon's shears; a lancet; a Bank of England note for 5 pounds; and about $200 in

loose gold and silver coin. During these proceedings Stumpy maintained a silence as impassive as the

dead on his left, a gravity as inscrutable as that of the newly born on his right. Only one incident

occurred to break the monotony of the curious procession. As Kentuck bent over the candle-box half

curiously, the child turned, and, in a spasm of pain, caught at his groping finger, and held it fast for a

moment. Kentuck looked foolish and embarrassed. Something like a blush tried to assert itself in his

weather-beaten cheek. "The damned little cuss!" he said, as he extricated his finger, with perhaps

more tenderness and care than he might have been deemed capable of showing. He held that fingera little apart from its fellows as he went out, and examined it curiously. The examination provoked

the same original remark in regard to the child. In fact, he seemed to enjoy repeating it. "He rastled

with my finger," he remarked to Tipton, holding up the member, "the damned little cuss!"

It was four o'clock before the camp sought repose. A light burnt in the cabin where the watchers sat,

for Stumpy did not go to bed that night. Nor did Kentuck. He drank quite freely, and related with

great gusto his experience, invariably ending with his characteristic condemnation of the newcomer.

It seemed to relieve him of any unjust implication of sentiment, and Kentuck had the weaknesses of

the nobler sex. When everybody else had gone to bed, he walked down to the river and whistled



reflectingly. Then he walked up the gulch past the cabin, still whistling with demonstrative

unconcern. At a large redwood-tree he paused and retraced his steps, and again passed the cabin.

Halfway down to the river's bank he again paused, and then returned and knocked at the door. It

was opened by Stumpy. "How goes it?" said Kentuck, looking past Stumpy toward the candle-box.

"All serene!" replied Stumpy. "Anything up?" "Nothing." There was a pause--an embarrassing one--

Stumpy still holding the door. Then Kentuck had recourse to his finger, which he held up to Stumpy.

"Rastled with it,--the damned little cuss," he said, and retired.

The next day Cherokee Sal had such rude sepulture as Roaring Camp afforded. After her body had

been committed to the hillside, there was a formal meeting of the camp to discuss what should be

done with her infant. A resolution to adopt it was unanimous and enthusiastic. But an animated

discussion in regard to the manner and feasibility of providing for its wants at once sprang up. It was

remarkable that the argument partook of none of those fierce personalities with which discussions

were usually conducted at Roaring Camp. Tipton proposed that they should send the child to Red

Dog,--a distance of forty miles,--where female attention could be procured. But the unlucky

suggestion met with fierce and unanimous opposition. It was evident that no plan which entailed

parting from their new acquisition would for a moment be entertained. "Besides," said Tom Ryder,

"them fellows at Red Dog would swap it, and ring in somebody else on us." A disbelief in the honesty

of other camps prevailed at Roaring Camp, as in other places.

The introduction of a female nurse in the camp also met with objection. It was argued that no

decent woman could be prevailed to accept Roaring Camp as her home, and the speaker urged that"they didn't want any more of the other kind." This unkind allusion to the defunct mother, harsh as

it may seem, was the first spasm of propriety,--the first symptom of the camp's regeneration.

Stumpy advanced nothing. Perhaps he felt a certain delicacy in interfering with the selection of a

possible successor in office. But when questioned, he averred stoutly that he and "Jinny"--the

mammal before alluded to--could manage to rear the child. There was something original,

independent, and heroic about the plan that pleased the camp. Stumpy was retained. Certain

articles were sent for to Sacramento. "Mind," said the treasurer, as he pressed a bag of gold-dust

into the expressman's hand, "the best that can be got,--lace, you know, and filigree-work and frills,--

damn the cost!"

Strange to say, the child thrived. Perhaps the invigorating climate of the mountain camp was

compensation for material deficiencies. Nature took the foundling to her broader breast. In that rare

atmosphere of the Sierra foothills,--that air pungent with balsamic odor, that ethereal cordial at

once bracing and exhilarating,--he may have found food and nourishment, or a subtle chemistry that

transmuted ass's milk to lime and phosphorus. Stumpy inclined to the belief that it was the latter

and good nursing. "Me and that ass," he would say, "has been father and mother to him! Don't you,"

he would add, apostrophizing the helpless bundle before him, "never go back on us."



By the time he was a month old the necessity of giving him a name became apparent. He had

generally been known as "The Kid," "Stumpy's Boy," "The Coyote" (an allusion to his vocal powers),

and even by Kentuck's endearing diminutive of "The damned little cuss." But these were felt to be

vague and unsatisfactory, and were at last dismissed under another influence. Gamblers and

adventurers are generally superstitious, and Oakhurst one day declared that the baby had brought

"the luck" to Roaring Camp. It was certain that of late they had been successful. "Luck" was the

name agreed upon, with the prefix of Tommy for greater convenience. No allusion was made to the

mother, and the father was unknown. "It's better," said the philosophical Oakhurst, "to take a fresh

deal all round. Call him Luck, and start him fair." A day was accordingly set apart for the christening.

What was meant by this ceremony the reader may imagine who has already gathered some idea of

the reckless irreverence of Roaring Camp. The master of ceremonies was one "Boston," a noted wag,

and the occasion seemed to promise the greatest facetiousness. This ingenious satirist had spent

two days in preparing a burlesque of the Church service, with pointed local allusions. The choir was

properly trained, and Sandy Tipton was to stand godfather. But after the procession had marched to

the grove with music and banners, and the child had been deposited before a mock altar, Stumpystepped before the expectant crowd. "It ain't my style to spoil fun, boys," said the little man, stoutly

eyeing the faces around him," but it strikes me that this thing ain't exactly on the squar. It's playing it

pretty low down on this yer baby to ring in fun on him that he ain't goin' to understand. And ef

there's goin' to be any godfathers round, I'd like to see who's got any better rights than me." A

silence followed Stumpy's speech. To the credit of all humorists be it said that the first man to

acknowledge its justice was the satirist thus stopped of his fun. "But," said Stumpy, quickly following

up his advantage, "we're here for a christening, and we'll have it. I proclaim you Thomas Luck,

according to the laws of the United States and the State of California, so help me God." It was the

first time that the name of the Deity had been otherwise uttered than profanely in the camp. The

form of christening was perhaps even more ludicrous than the satirist had conceived; but strangely

enough, nobody saw it and nobody laughed. "Tommy" was christened as seriously as he would have

been under a Christian roof and cried and was comforted in as orthodox fashion.

And so the work of regeneration began in Roaring Camp. Almost imperceptibly a change came over

the settlement. The cabin assigned to "Tommy Luck"--or "The Luck," as he was more frequently

called--first showed signs of improvement. It was kept scrupulously clean and whitewashed. Then it

was boarded, clothed, and papered. The rose wood cradle, packed eighty miles by mule, had, in

Stumpy's way of putting it, "sorter killed the rest of the furniture." So the rehabilitation of the cabinbecame a necessity. The men who were in the habit of lounging in at Stumpy's to see "how 'The

Luck' got on" seemed to appreciate the change, and in self-defense the rival establishment of

"Tuttle's grocery" bestirred itself and imported a carpet and mirrors. The reflections of the latter on

the appearance of Roaring Camp tended to produce stricter habits of personal cleanliness. Again

Stumpy imposed a kind of quarantine upon those who aspired to the honor and privilege of holding

The Luck. It was a cruel mortification to Kentuck--who, in the carelessness of a large nature and the

habits of frontier life, had begun to regard all garments as a second cuticle, which, like a snake's,

only sloughed off through decay--to be debarred this privilege from certain prudential reasons. Yet

such was the subtle influence of innovation that he thereafter appeared regularly every afternoon in

a clean shirt and face still shining from his ablutions. Nor were moral and social sanitary laws

neglected. "Tommy," who was supposed to spend his whole existence in a persistent attempt to



repose, must not be disturbed by noise. The shouting and yelling, which had gained the camp its

infelicitous title, were not permitted within hearing distance of Stumpy's. The men conversed in

whispers or smoked with Indian gravity. Profanity was tacitly given up in these sacred precincts, and

throughout the camp a popular form of expletive, known as "D--n the luck!" and "Curse the luck!"

was abandoned, as having a new personal bearing. Vocal music was not interdicted, being supposed

to have a soothing, tranquilizing quality; and one song, sung by "Man-o'-War Jack," an English sailor

from her Majesty's Australian colonies, was quite popular as a lullaby. It was a lugubrious recital of

the exploits of "the Arethusa, Seventy-four," in a muffled minor, ending with a prolonged dying fall

at the burden of each verse, "On b-oo-o-ard of the Arethusa." It was a fine sight to see Jack holding

The Luck, rocking from side to side as if with the motion of a ship, and crooning forth this naval ditty.

Either through the peculiar rocking of Jack or the length of his song,--it contained ninety stanzas, and

was continued with conscientious deliberation to the bitter end,--the lullaby generally had the

desired effect. At such times the men would lie at full length under the trees in the soft summer

twilight, smoking their pipes and drinking in the melodious utterances. An indistinct idea that this

was pastoral happiness pervaded the camp. "This 'ere kind o' think," said the Cockney Simmons,meditatively reclining on his elbow, "is 'evingly." It reminded him of Greenwich.

On the long summer days The Luck was usually carried to the gulch from whence the golden store of

Roaring Camp was taken. There, on a blanket spread over pine boughs, he would lie while the men

were working in the ditches below. Latterly there was a rude attempt to decorate this bower with

flowers and sweet-smelling shrubs, and generally some one would bring him a cluster of wild

honeysuckles, azaleas, or the painted blossoms of Las Mariposas. The men had suddenly awakened

to the fact that there were beauty and significance in these trifles, which they had so long trodden

carelessly beneath their feet. A flake of glittering mica, a fragment of variegated quartz, a bright

pebble from the bed of the creek, became beautiful to eyes thus cleared and strengthened, and

were invariably pat aside for The Luck. It was wonderful how many treasures the woods and hillsides

yielded that "would do for Tommy." Surrounded by playthings such as never child out of fairyland

had before, it is to he hoped that Tommy was content. He appeared to be serenely happy, albeit

there was an infantine gravity about him, a contemplative light in his round gray eyes, that

sometimes worried Stumpy. He was always tractable and quiet, and it is recorded that once, having

crept beyond his "corral,"--a hedge of tessellated pine boughs, which surrounded his bed,--he

dropped over the bank on his head in the soft earth, and remained with his mottled legs in the air in

that position for at least five minutes with unflinching gravity. He was extricated without a murmur. Ihesitate to record the many other instances of his sagacity, which rest, unfortunately, upon the

statements of prejudiced friends. Some of them were not without a tinge of superstition. "I crep' up

the bank just now," said Kentuck one day, in a breathless state of excitement "and dern my skin if he

was a-talking to a jay bird as was a-sittin' on his lap. There they was, just as free and sociable as

anything you please, a- jawin' at each other just like two cherrybums." Howbeit, whether creeping

over the pine boughs or lying lazily on his back blinking at the leaves above him, to him the birds

sang, the squirrels chattered, and the flowers bloomed. Nature was his nurse and playfellow. For

him she would let slip between the leaves golden shafts of sunlight that fell just within his grasp; she

would send wandering breezes to visit him with the balm of bay and resinous gum; to him the tall

redwoods nodded familiarly and sleepily, the bumblebees buzzed, and the rooks cawed a slumbrous

accompaniment.



Such was the golden summer of Roaring Camp. They were "flush times," and the luck was with them.

The claims had yielded enormously. The camp was jealous of its privileges and looked suspiciously

on strangers. No encouragement was given to immigration, and, to make their seclusion more

perfect, the land on either side of the mountain wall that surrounded the camp they dulypreempted. This, and a reputation for singular proficiency with the revolver, kept the reserve of

Roaring Camp inviolate. The expressman--their only connecting link with the surrounding world--

sometimes told wonderful stories of the camp. He would say, "They've a street up there in 'Roaring'

that would lay over any street in Red Dog. They've got vines and flowers round their houses, and

they wash themselves twice a day. But they're mighty rough on strangers, and they worship an Ingin

baby."

With the prosperity of the camp came a desire for further improvement. It was proposed to build ahotel in the following spring, and to invite one or two decent families to reside there for the sake of

The Luck, who might perhaps profit by female companionship. The sacrifice that this concession to

the sex cost these men, who were fiercely skeptical in regard to its general virtue and usefulness,

can only be accounted for by their affection for Tommy. A few still held out. But the resolve could

not be carried into effect for three months, and the minority meekly yielded in the hope that

something might turn up to prevent it. And it did.

The winter of 1851 will long be remembered in the foothills. The snow lay deep on the Sierras, and

every mountain creek became a river, and every river a lake. Each gorge and gulch was transformed

into a tumultuous watercourse that descended the hillsides, tearing down giant trees and scattering

its drift and debris along the plain. Red Dog had been twice under water, and Roaring Camp had

been forewarned. "Water put the gold into them gulches," said Stumpy. "It been here once and will

be here again!" And that night the North Fork suddenly leaped over its banks and swept up the

triangular valley of Roaring Camp.

In the confusion of rushing water, crashing trees, and crackling timber, and the darkness which

seemed to flow with the water and blot out the fair valley, but little could be done to collect thescattered camp. When the morning broke, the cabin of Stumpy, nearest the river-bank, was gone.

Higher up the gulch they found the body of its unlucky owner; but the pride, the hope, the joy, The

Luck, of Roaring Camp had disappeared. They were returning with sad hearts when a shout from the

bank recalled them.

It was a relief-boat from down the river. They had picked up, they said, a man and an infant, nearly

exhausted, about two miles below. Did anybody know them, and did they belong here?

the luck of rorain

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